And those that aren’t aware of this are losing money day after day. Literally.

I’ve gathered a list of 11 persuasive writing techniques that I have personally tested with both, my own copies and copies for some clients, and I can guarantee that they work.

Are you ready to start selling more online?

1. Entice your readers with benefits-oriented copies

It’s the very first tip that I always give to my clients and yet the most common mistake that I see online.

If someone is looking for a product or service, it’s because there’s a problem behind, something that makes him/her need this product or service.

I’m sure that if you think about it, what you sell have (at least) a positive impact in your clients’ lives. That’s what you should explicitly tell your potential clients with your copy.

When the needs of your clients match the benefits of what you’re selling, the chances of selling increase dramatically.

How can you do it?

Take the list of features of your products or services. This also works if you want to convince a potential client to hire you over your competitors.

Beside each feature, you need to write what’s the benefit for your client. For example:

I’m selling one-to-one couching services à My couching services are tailored to your needs to tackle specifically those areas that you need to improve. à You will receive specific and tailored tips focused on overcoming your obstacles. à You’ll be able to make your business grow through tailored tips adjusted to your personal situation.

You see? We can transform a feature of your couching services into a benefit for your readers. Which statement do you think it’s more appealing?

Now you need to follow this process with each feature of your products or services. Remember that our clients aren’t always specialised enough to understand all the features of our products. Of course, they are important as well, but in general, people are going to pay attention to the benefits.

2. What’s the added value of your promise?

Every product or service must be accompanied by a promise. Try to complete this sentence:

My [insert your product or service] is aimed at [insert promise]. It’s different from my competitors’ because [insert added value].

This added value is what you need to focus on through your sales copy. It must be the core of your message. What’s the difference between buying from you and buying from your competitors?

If you can’t answer this question, you need to spend some time now thinking about it. (Well, you can finish reading this post first!)

Also, you need to repeat this added value together with your promise through your copy. Make it clear. You readers need to know at first glance what they’re getting when they buy from you.

3. Answer your readers’ questions

When we’re buying something, we always have a series of questions in our minds.

You need to be sure of answering them all in your copy. This way, your potential clients won’t have any ‘excuse’ not to buy your product.

I always use two strategies to come up with questions that my potential clients may have:

Go to any forum related to what you’re selling and look for any questions that people are asking. You should pay special attention to repeated questions, as they’d be the most common and problematic ones. You can also pay attention to answers to these questions and see if that applies to your products.

Have a look at your competitors’ websites. Sometime they include a FAQ section in their websites. Have a look at them and see if any of them applies to your product. Again, maybe the answers can help you come up with the perfect solution to these questions.

4. Use sensory adjectives to make your readers feel

Verbs are the most powerful words. They make you act. That’s true.

However, sensory adjectives can make you feel.

One of the main problems when selling online is that we can’t touch the product that we’re buying. This problem becomes even more difficult to overcome when selling services, as they’re not tangible goods.

Although some of the words I have highlighted are nouns, you can see that they evoke the sense of touch. They make the reader feel the touch of the blanket and they’re also describing how the buyer would feel if he buys it.

How can you do it?

If you’re selling a product, you need to think of the five different senses: sound, sight, touch, smell and taste. You need to select those that are important for your product; obviously, you won’t be able to apply them all.

Think about adjectives that best describe your product and don’t forget to include them in your copy.

You can also read some reviews to get to know how people describe a product. That can help you come up with a list of sensory words.

If you’re selling services as I do, we’ve got a bigger problem, because our services may not be tangible. That’s why we need to evoke in our readers how they’re going to feel and what they’re going to achieve when buying from us.

We need to tell them how they’re feeling and how they’re going to feel once they’ve hired us. In other words, how his situation is going to change.

5. Don’t hide the negative aspects of what you sell

If there’s something wrong, they’re going to notice. And they’ll get very angry if they didn’t know beforehand.

That’s why we should be always honest.

If there’s a negative aspect, spell it out. You should weight both positive and negative aspects in a balance, and make obvious that there’re more advantages than disadvantages.

If you think that it’s the other way round, then you should step back and see how to hone your product to overcome some of these disadvantages.

6. Scarcity: it’s now or never

This applies especially to exclusive offers.

Make sure that you use urgency in your message. It’s the first and last time you’re offering X, and they must know that it’s now or never.

Sometimes this is what indecisive potential clients need to make a move. If they were thinking about buying this product at some point, it would be the best chance to do it. So don’t be afraid to say so.

7. Confuse your reader to attract his attention

Multi what?

You probably didn’t know what Multi-Touch refers to until you read the description.

This is called: the disrupt and reframe technique. And it’s something that Apple does very effectively.

You confuse your reader through a new and appealing headline. Something that sounds good but your reader won’t be able to understand exactly; and then you force your client to read the description to get to know what that is and entice him.

I’m sure that now you all will pay more attention to Apple headlines. That happened to me when I first discovered this technique!

8. Endowed Progress Effect

The Endowed Progress Effect is simply letting your readers know that by buying from you, they’ll be making a progress to achieve a final goal.

Let’s see this though an example:

Imagine that you’re selling portrait photography courses. Three in total. Your promise is that after taking these three courses, your clients will be ready to take the best portraits, but you sell these three courses separately, so people can chose if they need to take only one or the three of them.

Well, then if you tell your clients who took the first course that they’re two steps behind being able to take the best portraits, you’ll have more chances to make them buy the second one.

And the 9th persuasive writing technique and one of my most recent discoveries that I haven’t doubted to test myself:

9. Maslow’s hierarchy of needs

Every product and service is related to one of these needs. You should know exactly how what you sell relates to it.

If you understand the psychological need of your product, you’ll be able to write a sales copy optimised to your clients’ needs.

The first thing you should do is to relate your product to one of the needs and then try to be as specific as possible with this need. Think from the perspective of your client and design an ICA if needed.

What are his biggest fears? What does he worry about? What are his weaknesses?

Brainstorm and then tackle all this point in your copy.

With these 9 persuasive techniques you’ll be able to increase the sales of your business and increase the conversion rates of your landing pages. Have you already used any of them? Did they work for you? I’d love to hear from you.

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About David Miralles Perez

My name is David Miralles and I am aware of how languages can influence professional environments. Honing communication between two cultures has become crucial in today’s globalized world. And that is what I do by means of my translation and interpreting services. Small and medium enterprises and individuals can now spread their messages through cultural and linguistic barriers and make a big impact on an international scale.

About Me

My name is David Miralles and I am aware of how languages can influence professional environments. Honing communication between two cultures has become crucial in today’s globalized world. And that is what I do by means of my translation and interpreting services. Small and medium enterprises and individuals can now spread their messages through cultural and linguistic barriers and make a big impact on an international scale.